Huntington Beach Solar

Solar Company in Huntington Beach

Install Solar Panels to Cut Costs

The sun is amazing, especially considering that the energy it puts out is so powerful that the amount our planet absorbs in one hour is enough to cover the energy needs of our planet for one year. While this form of energy arrives as heat and light, that doesn’t mean it can’t be converted into a usable form of energy. By installing solar panels in your home, you can have a very practical and inexpensive form of energy that has many uses.

To explain this, let’s think of solar panels as a box that holds solar cells together. The energy that solar cells produce from sunlight is electricity. The rays of the sun which strike the solar cells, which are made of silicone, will generate electricity upon contact. Only a half of a volt of power per cell is generated from sunlight necessitating the use of many solar panels to provide electricity. You can actually make your own solar panel at home and it doesn’t really cost much, especially since then you will be able to enjoy the benefits of free electricity. If you are good at do-it-yourself projects, more than likely you will be able to create and soldered together your very own solar panels. A solar panel is connected to batteries and most of them use the regular 12 volt batteries that are used in cars. No need to be fancy; just find an ordinary lead acid battery for this particular job. Some institutions provide these batteries for free which is something you should look into if you are going to need a lot of them. This electricity needs to be converted, so you will need to have a power inverter to convert the energy to be used around your house. This means you should get a true sine wave or modified energy converter. To get 60 MHz electricity, like out of your outlet, you must purchase or have a true sine wave inverter. Of course, these models are more expensive than their modified counterparts, are well worth the cost.

You will need a container to put the series of solar cells that will make up your solar panel into if you are taking the do it yourself route. Wood is the most widely used material for these containers although there are a wide range of other materials that can also be used. You can use whatever type of wood you like but plywood is a great option for the back. You will then need to have some sort of stabilization inside the box (usually wood as well) and a top made of plexiglass to cover the container. Since sunlight needs to get into each cell, plexiglass coverings are perfect ways to protect the cells from the elements and still allow full sun exposure to the cells. It’s important that you remember to drill a whole for the wires to be pulled out of. Once you mount the solar cells, you will need to do a bit of soldering to connect the cells to each other.

As you can see, building a solar panel requires a bit of skill with tools but it is something anyone can do. In no time at all you can have your own solar panel up and running.